Thirty-two: she is standing up. She is looking at the meat again, defying it. The 
hunger she feels is plain on her face. So is the disgust.
  Thirty-three. She sleeps.
  'How long now?' asked Steve.
  'Five days. No, six.'
  Six days.
  Thirty-four. She is a blurred figure, apparently flinging herself against a wall. 
Perhaps beating her head against it, Steve couldn't be sure. He was past asking. Part of 
him didn't want to know.
  Thirty-five: she is again sleeping, this time beneath the table. The sleeping bag has 
been torn to pieces, shredded cloth and pieces of stuffing littering the room.
  Thirty-six: she speaks to the door, through the door, knowing she will get no answer.
  Thirty-seven: she eats the rancid meat.
  Calmly she sits under the table, like a primitive in her cave, and pulls at the meat 
with her incisors. Her face is again expressionless; all her energy is bent to the 
purpose of the moment. To eat. To eat 'til the hunger disappears, 'til the agony in her 
belly, and the sickness in her head disappear.
  Steve stared at the photograph.
  'It startled me,' said Quaid, 'how suddenly she gave in. One moment she seemed to have 
as much resistance as ever. The monologue at the door was the same mixture of threats and 
apologies as she'd delivered day in, day out. Then she broke. Just like that. Squatted 
under the table and ate the beef down to the bone, as though it were a choice cut.'
  Thirty-eight: she sleeps. The door is open. Light pours
  in.
  Thirty-nine: the room is empty.
  'Where did she go?'
  'She wandered downstairs. She came into the kitchen, drank several glasses of water, 
and sat in a chair for three or four hours without saying a word.'
  'Did you speak to her?'
  'Eventually. When she started to come out of her fugue state. The experiment was over. 
I didn't want to hurt her.'
  'What did she say?'
  'Nothing.'
  'Nothing?'
  'Nothing at all. For a long time I don't believe she was even aware of my presence in 
the room. Then I cooked some potatoes, which she ate.'
  'She didn't try and call the police?' 'No.'
  'No violence?'
  'No. She knew what I'd done, and why I'd done
  it. It wasn't pre-planned, but we'd talked about such experiments, in abstract 
conversations. She hadn't come to any harm, you see. She'd lost a bit of weight perhaps, 
but that was about all.'
  'Where is she now?'
  'She left the day after. I don't know where she went.'
  'And what did it all prove?'
  'Nothing at all, perhaps. But it made an interesting start to my investigations.'
  'Start? This was only a start?'
  There was plain disgust for Quaid in Steve's voice.
  'Stephen -'
  'You could have killed her!'
  'No.'
  'She could have lost her mind. Unbalanced her per-manently.'
  'Possibly. But unlikely. She was a strong-willed woman.'
  'But you broke her.'
  'Yes. It was a journey she was ready to take. We'd talked of going to face her fear. So 
here was I, arranging for Cheryl to do just that. Nothing much really.'
  'You forced her to do it. She wouldn't have gone otherwise.'
  'True. It was an education for her.'
  'So now you're a teacher?'
  Steve wished he'd been able to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. But it was there. 
Sarcasm; anger; and a little fear.
  'Yes, I'm a teacher,' Quaid replied, looking at Steve obliquely, his eyes not focused. 
'I'm teaching people dread.'
  Steve stared at the floor. 'Are you satisfied with what you've taught?'
  'And learned, Steve. I've learned too. It's a very exciting prospect: a world of fears 
to investigate. Especially with inteffigent subjects. Even in the face of rationalization 
-'
  Steve stood up. 'I don't want to hear any more.'
  'Oh? OK.'
  'I've got classes early tomorrow.'
  'No.'
  'What?'
  A beat, faltering.
  'No. Don't go yet.'
  'Why?' His heart was racing. He feared Quaid, he'd never realized how profoundly.
  'I've got some more books to give you.'
  Steve felt his face flush. Slightly. What had he thought in that moment? That Quaid was 
going to bring him down with a rugby tackle and start experimenting on his fears?
  No. Idiot thoughts.
  'I've got a book on Kierkegaard you'll like. Upstairs. I'll be two minutes.'
  Smiling, Quaid left the room.
  
  Steve squatted on his haunches and began to sheaf through the photographs again. It was 
the moment when Cheryl first picked up the rotting meat that fascinated him most. Her 
face wore an expression completely uncha-racteristic of the woman he had known. Doubt was 
written there, and confusion, and deep -Dread.
  It was Quaid's word. A dirty word. An obscene word, associated from this night on with 
Quaid's torture of an innocent girl.
  For a moment Steve thought of the expression on his own face, as he stared down at the 
photograph. Was there not some of the same confusion on his face? And perhaps some of the 
dread too, waiting for release.
  He heard a sound behind him, too soft to be Quaid.
  Unless he was creeping.
  Oh, God, unless he was -A pad of chloroformed cloth was clamped over Steve's
  mouth and his nostrils. Involuntarily, he inhaled and the vapours stung his sinuses, 
made his eyes water.
  A blob of blackness appeared at the corner of the world, just out of sight, and it 
started to grow, this stain, pulsing to the rhythm of his quickening heart.
  In the centre of Steve's head he could see Quaid's voice as a veil. It said his name.
  'Stephen.'